Press Play with Madeleine Brand: California case: free speech v. abortion rightsCrisis pregnancy centers are generally run by pro-life groups that aim to convince pregnant women not to get abortions. A California law requires that employees tell their clients that the state offers free and low-cost abortions and other family planning services. Now a group of these centers is arguing that the law violates their freedom of speech.

UnFictionalUnbelievably true stories of chance encounters that changed the world. A pair of mail-order shoes that led to the film The Outsiders. A secret road to a California paradise. The day LA and smog first met. Stories that will stick in your head like a memory. It’s UnFictional, hosted by Bob Carlson.

The DocumentThe Document is a new kind of mash-up between documentaries and radio. It goes beyond clips and interviews, mining great stories from the raw footage of documentaries present, past and in-progress. A new episode is available every other Wednesday on iTunes and wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.

To the PointA weekly reality-check on the issues Americans care about most. Host Warren Olney draws on his decades of experience to explore the people and issues shaping – and disrupting - our world. How did everything change so fast? Where are we headed? The conversations are informal, edgy and always informative. If Warren's asking, you want to know the answer.

FROM THIS EPISODE

Boosters of growth in Hollywood have suffered a setback, while opponents of increased density have scored a victory. This time, it's not all about earthquake faults. A judge has ruled that the best-laid plans of city officials are "fundamentally flawed." How long will development of hotels, office buildings and apartment houses be delayed? Also, does Glendale have a foreign policy? The city's being sued over a statue that offends some Americans of Japanese ancestry and Japanese officials.

Later on To the Point, advocates for increasing the federal minimum wage call it a "stimulus program" paid for, not by government, but the private sector. Opponents warn of lost jobs and hard times for small business. We'll hear that some cities, states — and even some big companies — are increasing wages as debate goes on in Washington.

State Senator Ron Calderon turned himself in today in Los Angeles. The Montebello Democrat faces 395 years in prison on 24 counts of fraud, wire fraud, honest services fraud, bribery, conspiracy to commit money laundering, money laundering and aiding in the filing of false tax returns — all lodged against him by Federal authorities. For almost 10 years, Bob Stern was general counsel to the California Fair Political Practices Commission, which he helped create in 1974, along with then-Secretary of State Jerry Brown. Stern has said his job was "taming a system that was a free-flowing river of political money."

The neighborhood of Hollywood has been emerging from the Great Recession. For some, it's not happening fast enough but, for others, it's too fast. Now development is on hold for at least a month. That's how long the City Council has given the Planning Department to respond to a judge's order that the updated Hollywood Community Plan is so full of "errors of fact and law" that it's "fundamentally flawed."

Last
July, a half-ton bronze statue was erected in Glendale's
Central Park, showing a woman in traditional
Korean clothing next to an empty chair. A plaque explains that she's emblematic
of the 80 to 200 thousand women allegedly enslaved as "comfort women"
during World War II to serve as prostitutes for Japanese soldiers. Delegations
of Japanese officials have visited Central Park
and asked that the statue be removed. Now Glendale's being sued by Glendale resident Michiko
Shiota Gingery. Brittany Levine is covering the story for the LA Times.